Away From N.B.A., Finding Success and Serenity in China

Stephon Marbury sounded content and tranquil last week as he described his new life in China. Perhaps it was because he was tired; after all, it was nearly midnight in Beijing.

Or maybe Marbury was simply content.

“I have no complaints,” he said. “I’m blessed; life is good.”

On the court, Marbury is the catalyst for the undefeated Beijing Ducks of the Chinese Basketball Association, who are off to their best start in 16 years. They won their sixth game Friday, defeating Kenyon Martin’s Xinjiang team, 99-97. On Sunday, they defeated Shanxi, 121-92, with Marbury scoring 19 points. He is averaging 22.3 points, 5.7 assists and 1.9 steals a game for the Ducks, who signed him in August.

Marbury, 34, is flourishing off the court as well. He said acclimating to a new culture was the best thing about this part of his odyssey, which has taken him from Lincoln High School on Coney Island to Georgia Tech to the N.B.A. After an often-tumultuous 13-year N.B.A. career, Marbury said that in China, he had found a home, a revitalized career. He maintains residences in Los Angeles and New York, but China, he said, is his soul’s new resting place.

Marbury is in a great space: his own driver, an apartment in Beijing in the equivalent of the Wall Street district and a team that could help him win his first pro basketball championship.

“I never thought in my life that I’d end up going to China and wanting to spend the rest of my life here,” he said.

Marbury also writes a weekly newspaper column in China Daily. Given his often contentious relations with the news media in the United States, this gig is one of the greatest punch lines of the new chapter of his life.

“It’s beautiful when you can tell your own story,” he said.

Other former N.B.A. players are playing in China. During the recently ended lockout, four-high profile players signed with Chinese Basketball Association teams: Martin with Xinjiang, Wilson Chandler with Zhejiang Guangsha, J. R. Smith with Zhejiang Chouzhou and Aaron Brooks with four-time defending champion Guangdong.

Unlike players who signed with European teams, the players in China are contractually obligated to play the entire Chinese season, which ends in March.

What may come as the biggest surprise to those who remember Marbury’s N.B.A. days is that he has become a bridge over troubled waters for Chandler, Smith and Brooks. He helped Brooks, formerly of the Houston Rockets, and Chandler, formerly of the Knicks and the Denver Nuggets, adjust to the food and nuances of China. Marbury talks with Chandler every other day.

Marbury even recently counseled Smith, a former Nugget, after he had clashes with his team, which threatened to void his contract. The team suspected Smith was purposely missing practices and games once he realized he would be held to his contract.

“I spoke with J. R. and I told him to make himself completely vulnerable to love: embrace the culture,” Marbury said. “You’ve got to acclimate yourself to something different, you’ve got to grow into it — and then you get this stillness and calmness about yourself.”

Photo

Stephon Marbury is averaging 22.3 points a game for Beijing of the Chinese Basketball Association.Credit
Forbes Conrad for The New York Times

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That sounds good, though the reality is that Marbury, Smith, Brooks and Chandler are at different points in their careers. Chandler, Brooks and Smith are looking for big paychecks and the glamour that comes with being an N.B.A. player. Marbury, who has had all of that, was looking for a sanctuary.

His last three seasons in the N.B.A. were a nightmare, even as he fulfilled a boyhood dream of playing for the Knicks. He feuded with two Knicks coaches, Larry Brown and Mike D’Antoni, and had a falling out with his mentor Isiah Thomas.

As part of a sexual harassment suit against Madison Square Garden, Marbury had to testify under oath that he had sex with an intern. There was also a bizarre video he made in July 2009 in which he appeared to weep intensely and at one point ate Vaseline. Clearly, Marbury needed a change.

Marbury said the crying occurred because he was thinking about his father, Don, who died Dec. 2, 2007, during a Knicks-Suns game. “If you know anything about us, you know that my father was the leader at the helm of all of the Marburys,” he said. “He was the man, period.”

In early 2009, the Knicks bought out Marbury’s contract, under which he was due $20.8 million for that season, and he signed with the Boston Celtics. Boston offered a one-year deal for the 2009-10 season, but Marbury was wise enough to say enough. He needed a break — from the N.B.A., from New York, from the United States.

In January 2010, Marbury signed with the Shanxi Zhongyu Brave Dragons of the Chinese league. He left the Brave Dragons last December to join Foshan.

Bill Duffy, a longtime sports agent with deep roots in China, has followed Marbury since his high school days. He also represented Yao Ming when he entered the N.B.A.

“The guy was losing his mind before he left,” Duffy said of Marbury. “Relatives all over him, living in a fish bowl in New York City, this issue, that issue; sitting on the bench with the Knicks, they won’t let you play, then being banned from the facility. He just needed to get someplace where people don’t know him and he can just be a regular person but still have that allure as a basketball player. Just in a condensed form.”

During the course of a conversation with Marbury, it was suggested that his was a temporary move. “It ain’t temporary, it’s for good,” Marbury corrected. “I’m going to stay here, I’m going to live here. I love it here.

“I didn’t come here because basketball was out; I came here to rebuild myself, retire myself. I lost my father — I was dealing with a lot. People couldn’t really understand that; I’m like you think I’m crazy, but I’m so far from crazy.”

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The lives of young professional athletes are a succession of chapters. For Marbury, there was the New York City playground and high school legend; the college star; and the N.B.A. player who did well but never lived up to manufactured expectations.

The final chapter of Marbury’s basketball life is unfolding in China, a place he unwaveringly calls home. “The country gave me everything I needed to get my spirits back to where I needed them to be, they gave me an opportunity to play basketball again and they gave me an opportunity to build a brand here,” he said.

China is like a forgotten road, though that is likely to change before long. Yao Ming owns a team and plans to open a basketball academy in Shanghai. Marbury plans to conduct clinics and basketball workshops and would like to coach the Chinese national team.

He also plans to restart his Starbury sneaker and sports apparel line this month. His playing career in the N.B.A. and his war with the N.B.A. are over.

“I don’t have a desire to come back to the N.B.A.,” Marbury said. “I’m done; I’m running for something; I’m not running for them no more.”

Correction: December 6, 2011

Because of an editing error, the Sports of The Times column on Monday, about Stephon Marbury’s success playing in the Chinese Basketball Association, misspelled the name of the Chinese team of another former N.B.A. player, Aaron Brooks. It is Guangdong, not Guandong.

E-mail: wcr@nytimes.com

A version of this article appears in print on December 5, 2011, on page D8 of the New York edition with the headline: Away From N.B.A., Finding Success and Serenity in China. Order Reprints|Today's Paper|Subscribe